THE YOUNG SCIENTIST. 
137 
are open to doubt, as the rediscovery 
of an abandoned nest, may be acci- 
dental, as in a case mentioned by Belt. 
But Carl Vogt, in his " Thierstauten," 
mentions that for several successive 
years ants from a certain nest used to go 
through several inhabited nests to a 
chemist's shop 600 yards distant, in order 
to obtain access to a vessel filled with 
syrup." This was continued for several 
seasons, thus showing that the ants re- 
membered the syrup jar from year to 
year. 
As a proof that ants have some means 
of communication among themselves, we 
have but to describe the experiment per- 
formed by Sir J. Lubbock : Three glasses 
were connected witli a nest of black ants 
by meaijs of three tapes, equal in length 
and width, and placed parallel with each 
other, so that the means of access from 
the nest to each glass were exactly 
equal. In one of the glasses were placed 
from three hundred to six hundred larvae, 
in the second two or three only, and in the 
third none at all. The object of the last 
was to see whether any ants would arrive 
at the glasses by mere accident. The ex- 
perimentalist then put a mature ant into 
each glass. Each of them took a larva 
and carried it to the nest, returning for 
another, and so on. After each journey 
another larva was put in the glass con- 
taining only a few larvae. Sir J. Lubbock 
reasoned that if the ants came to the 
glasses as a matter of accident, or accom- 
panied one another by chance, or if they 
merely saw larvae being brought, and con- 
cluded that more might be found in the 
isame place, or if the ants were merely 
guided by the scented track of their fore- 
runners, the number of the ants going to 
each of the two glasses ought to be ap- 
proximately equal. But this was not the 
•case. To the glass containing many 
larvae there came, in 475 hours, 257 ants ; 
to that with only two or three larvae there 
came in a time longer by 5k hours, only 
^2 ants ; and to the glass containing no 
larvae there came not one. Hence it is 
-concluded that ants can not only tell their 
-companions that work is to be done, but 
«an give some idea of its quantity, and of 
the number of hands required for its per- 
formance. Tlie precaution taken by Sir 
J. Lubbock, will, on careful considera- 
tion be found to exclude every other in- 
terpretation of the facts. 
A Mr. H. L. Jenkins tells the following : 
"There are good reasons for supposing 
that elephants possess abstract ideas ; for 
instance, I think it impossible to doubt 
that they acquire through their own ex- 
perience notions of hardness and weight. 
The grounds on which I am led to think 
thus are as follows : A captured ele- 
phant, after he has been taught his ordin- 
ary duty, is taught to i)ick up things from 
the ground and give themx to his mahout 
sitting upon his shoulders. For the first 
few months it is dangerous to require 
him to pick up anything but soft articles, 
because the things are often handed up 
with considerable force. After a time 
they appear to take in a knowledge of the 
nature of the things they are required to 
lift, and a bundle of cloths will be thrown 
sharply as before, but heavy things, such 
as a crowbar or iron chain, will be handed 
up in a gentle manner ; a sharp knife will 
be picked up by the handle and placed on 
the elephant's head, so that the mahout 
I can also take it by the handle. I have 
purposely given elephants things to lift 
which they could never have seen before, 
and they were handled in such a manner 
as to convince me that they recognized 
such qualities as hardness, shari>ness, 
and weight." 
Mr. Peal observed a young recently 
captured elephant, in Assam, pulling up 
and breaking some bamboo stakes, and 
carefully examining the pieces. " At last 
it seized one firmly in its trunk, and ad- 
vancing its left foreleg firmly, passed the 
fragment of bamboo under the arm-pit, 
and began to scratch with some force. A 
large elephant leech soon fell to the 
ground, which, from its position, could 
not easily be detatched without this 
scraper, which had been deliberately 
made by the elephant." The narrator 
very truly says that these scrai)ers are 
bona fide tools, "intelligently made for 
ja definite purpose." Here we have an 
instance of an animal making and using 
tools to accomplish an end that would 
otherwise have been left undone. 
